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Carries, pudge and IMBA of the Light. Yes, you are still a beginner and gravitate towards star roles :P

I don't mind Dazzle, Warlock or Jakiro, so support isn't all bad. They're just not as fun as the others while I'm learning. Well, that and having to ward all the time, getting no last hits for gold and being under-leveled. :\ Pretty sure the last one was partly my fault for my first time tri-laning with no idea of where to stand. Not really sure, but I felt like the most useless Tidehunter ever in that one game.

I like supporting in other games, but DotA 2 support feels different so far.

Well, that and having to ward all the time, getting no last hits for gold and being under-leveled. :\

That's the support role, getting someone item-independent and survive through the game with little. Everyone wants to be the star, get farm and kill everyone and that's the problem with pubs.

You know, other than roles there is a farm priority classification if you are doing any small amount of team coordination, that goes 1 to 5. In pubs, everyone wants roles 1 and 2, 3 minimum, and nobody would ever play the warding/pure support role.

See the boots on the last panel? That's his only item. Well, sometimes for pubs to succeed "someone" has to play that role. Guess what.

And that's why I hate this game and thought of coming back to HoN, 300 hours in.

EDIT: The reason for this classification is that not everyone can get superfarmed, and two carries in one lane will give you two half-farmed ones instead of a single powerhouse with a low level backup to win in 35-40 minutes. In pubs you get 3-4 carries from which only one is decently farmed and the other are just trying hard so the game goes to 50+ minutes and they win by default.

I have the same or more hours in HoN (worse people, better players) and Dota 1 (hell on earth), there's still room for hatred :P

Your probably not in a great tier is all if thats the case, I can definately say that the people in DotA at a higher tier are far infront of the top tier HoN players; I think its just theres a greater range in DotA, the lower tier players are probably alot worse than the lower tier players in HoN.

Even in mid tier in DotA the importance of things like couriers, wards, rune control, etc... are intrinsic to a decent game, in HoN its not until your higher tier that you get to that point.

Also as for the Ezalor hate, if someone grabs him take a Nyx on the lane vs him and laugh all day, he'll stop waving after his first death to spiked carapace trust me. Pudge is also a great counter to him, he has to stand still to channel the wave..... free hook.

Just ward the jungle to the side of the lane so he doesn't get off any surprise ones, hes a high tier pick but not for the wave really.

Even in mid tier in DotA the importance of things like couriers, wards, rune control, etc... are intrinsic to a decent game, in HoN its not until your higher tier that you get to that point.

I tried recently in the 1550 tier in HoN and everyone was playing with wards and strategizing, I don't know when was the last time you played but most of the bad (russians) players went back to dota. There are no ladder matchmaking on Dota, or at least it's not transparent to me, but at this level there's always at least one or two "for fun" players per game.

hes a high tier pick but not for the wave really.

Originally Posted by me

I didn't mean illuminate, sorry, but the managiving skill. After those nerd Illuminate has a decent cost/risk ratio, but the spammability is the problem.

And yes, there are counters to Ezalor and everyone in the cast, but team composition is not a forte in public games. People can't even deal with a pudge FFS. Every time I see PL I just instapick Earthshaker, for example, but what does it matter when the rest of the team gets single-target carries and can't use my ult.

And yes, there are counters to Ezalor and everyone in the cast, but team composition is not a forte in public games. People can't even deal with a pudge FFS. Every time I see PL I just instapick Earthshaker, for example, but what does it matter when the rest of the team gets single-target carries and can't use my ult.

Instapick carries is a problem, you need to get in with a group of players that play fairly regularly and at least 3 of you can queue together, DotA2 seems to match make 5man teams vs 5 / 4+1 man teams as a priority meaning if you can get a group of 5 together you will ususally be vs a group of 5... the quality of play in that is MUCH better.

And if you want more still then TMM is really where the game shines imo.

HoN wise, yeh I haven't played in a long time, I left when the heroes started getting silly (I think the really fast guy - Blitz or something like that - was just coming out), I'd had enough of Emerald Warden and rediculousness like that lol. They may well have gotten alot better but I never saw any counter warding, creep camp blocking, lvl 1 ganks etc... in that game when I used to play. 5 man dota games now for me are routinely all about stuff like that.

I only play with 2+ friends now, even when playing solo winning/losing doesn't feel the same. The problem is, some of my friends just started (<100 games) and guess what heroes they want to play? As deadly.by.design said, for them support/gankers are boring and they gravitate toward star roles, except they are not as good as everyone else at their job, and an underfarmed/passive carry is just a waste of a slot in a team. The closest to support they can play is Zeus/Warlock.

I'm far from good at any role, but having to pick the Maiden/Lich instead of a 3-4 initiator hurts the rest of the team IMO.

I only play with 2+ friends now, even when playing solo winning/losing doesn't feel the same. The problem is, some of my friends just started (<100 games) and guess what heroes they want to play? As deadly.by.design said, for them support/gankers are boring and they gravitate toward star roles, except they are not as good as everyone else at their job, and an underfarmed/passive carry is just a waste of a slot in a team. The closest to support they can play is Zeus/Warlock.

I'm far from good at any role, but having to pick the Maiden/Lich instead of a 3-4 initiator hurts the rest of the team IMO.

No your right, generally you want your best player on the 1 slot but that can depend really.. the best player on our team usually plays a roaming ganker / sometimes a mid hero; he's most effective in that role, I guess it just comes down to finding a role that your all good at and working with it. I'm normally a hard carry but at the moment in our team I'm mid / support ganker alot of the time (somewhere in the 2-4 slot dependant on picks). For instance I played a support Nyx in a game recently and managed to keep them scared long enough for our Luna to come online.

People turf newer players off into the 5 slot alot because of like you say - their last hitting isn't as good, their carry never comes online and a support doesn't have the "cost" associated with it for the whole team if they die but a good slot 5 has to be able to eek out a living, make an impact on the game and all with no items + no levels, its probably the hardest job.

I think the most frustrating thing about playing support was not being allowed to last hit. I'm actually pretty good at it, so standing around and not doing it felt counter-intuitive. (especially when being asked to buy wards and upgrade the courier) Like I said, the RPS mumble guys were very gracious with me, but it was tough being the under-leveled tri-laner (i.e., easy kill) or gold-poor support with team purchase requests. Maybe I'll go straight for Venomancer the next time I have to play support, since it'll be cheaper lane warding.

Like I said, though, I think I'll be less frustrated if I don't play out of my league for a bit. High-ranked games may teach me a lot, but they also relegate me to a tough game + limited role. While I see the value in that, it would wear me down if I were to do it all the time. I can last hit and deny pretty well, barring when I was solo Slardar against two lane opponents (freakin' Kunkka might as well be ranged). But I won't learn the roam/gank/etc I need to do more by never doing it.

I think the most frustrating thing about playing support was not being allowed to last hit. I'm actually pretty good at it, so standing around and not doing it felt counter-intuitive. (especially when being asked to buy wards and upgrade the courier) Like I said, the RPS mumble guys were very gracious with me, but it was tough being the under-leveled tri-laner (i.e., easy kill) or gold-poor support with team purchase requests. Maybe I'll go straight for Venomancer the next time I have to play support, since it'll be cheaper lane warding.

Like I said, though, I think I'll be less frustrated if I don't play out of my league for a bit. High-ranked games may teach me a lot, but they also relegate me to a tough game + limited role. While I see the value in that, it would wear me down if I were to do it all the time. I can last hit and deny pretty well, barring when I was solo Slardar against two lane opponents (freakin' Kunkka might as well be ranged). But I won't learn the roam/gank/etc I need to do more by never doing it.

So things you can do to help your gold when your a support...

-Stack the neutrals and pull them into the lane to intercept your creeps, this brings your lane back under your tower so your carry is safer (don't do it if he's already at the tower, he'll end up tanking the creeps lol) but make sure you get the last hits on the jungle creeps while that happens, it's 2 camps of creeps for you, your looking at like 400 gold probably.

-Ask your team to gather up as a 4-5 after lvl 7-8 and push a tower, tower gold goes to everyone and it forces the enemy to respond. If your team doesn't push towers enough your supports can feel very tight on gold.

-Gank mid, if you get a kill as a duo on someone and you get the only assist its on average (someone did the maths on this but I can't find um) the same as you getting the kill -2 lane creep kills. (So about 80g difference).

-It sounds stupid but make sure you don't die early on, it will strangle your gold and then you'll be in a position where you don't have the items for hp and die to their ganks constantly.

Yeah though, support can feel very stretched for cash; especially if the game isn't going well from the start, it can be a nightmare, adapt your build, ask one of the others to grab a set of wards so you can save for a bracer or something for some health (There should if possible be someone else in a position to be a semi support and grab a set of wards).

Don't gimp your gold to much by buying courier and wards at the start, get 1 or the other and ask someone else to get the other. Generally the safe lane should get the courier and the offlane get the wards if your doing a 2-1-2 setup (i.e. like most pub games). If your in "one of them" pub games then grab the courier and buy the wards after

After all is said and done though... Support isn't for some people, I think its worth learning every role so you know what your friends are having to do etc... but still, maybe your just destined to enjoy mid lane gankers more etc...

Don't gimp your gold to much by buying courier and wards at the start, get 1 or the other and ask someone else to get the other. Generally the safe lane should get the courier and the offlane get the wards if your doing a 2-1-2 setup (i.e. like most pub games). If your in "one of them" pub games then grab the courier and buy the wards after

Just played a single draft game on my lunch break. My choices were Alchy, Morphling or Nature's Prophet. Teammates were Clockwerk, Slark, Shadow Demon and Huskar, so I naturally (hah) went NP. Of course, nobody bought wards or courier, but maybe it was an unspoken assumption that I was supposed to do that anyway. Either way, I did it, and tried to do everything I could to play NP as a global support. It went pretty well in the early laning phase, tho they did get a good surprise gank on us. Eventually, I was looking out for what they'd do and warping around the map to meet needs. Once I got a few items, things started to really pick up. Their Luna kept targeting me by popping her Shadow Blade + ult, but I was able to avoid it after the first time she got me.

The most satisfying moment was probably when I teleported from mid to their base steps to catch & kill a fleeing Sven. That was fun. Generally, though, I just helped cause confusion/body-blocking with my trees, Sprouted enemy targets to assist kills or save allies, and threw down my ult for team fights. Maybe I wasn't playing him how they would recommend in higher tiers, but it fit the role pretty well for a pub game.

After all is said and done though... Support isn't for some people, I think its worth learning every role so you know what your friends are having to do etc... but still, maybe your just destined to enjoy mid lane gankers more etc...

Yeah, I'm willing to keep playing support when the team needs it. I'm feeling better about it after today's game, and thinking Monday's matches were just extra frustrating due to skill/rank mismatch.

What I feel I need to work on right now is pulling creeps and stacking. It hasn't quite clicked for me yet.

'Grats, DenieD. I caught another RPS game yesterday. This time it was 5v5 in-house and it went pretty well. Did more support as Jakiro. I seem to have a much better idea of what to do in the laning phase than when things get more complicated later.